Description

Season 5, Episode 712: 

What happens when creativity becomes both escape and healing?

Dean Robert Holmes, a transmasculine author from St. Paul, Minnesota, uses writing to manage schizoaffective disorder and explore identity through fiction. Since 2020, he's written over 350 fanfics and 2.5 million words (that's equivalent to five copies of Stephen King's "It") before publishing his collection "Unlocked: Seven Titillating Tales of Gay Trans Love and Lust." Dean identifies as aegosexual, experiencing attraction only through third-person perspectives, and thrives in a relationship with his fiancée May through roleplay where he never portrays himself.

In this conversation, Dean dives into his writing processes as a pantser who daydreams his way through stories. They discuss maladaptive daydreaming as a coping mechanism, the challenges of balancing creativity with social media, and how indie publishing has shattered traditional word count constraints (finally!). Both Dean and Ruan share experiences of losing mothers to suicide, which fuels an urgency in their writing careers.

Dean's upcoming May release, "Treading Water," features a gender-fluid bi man and a plus-size woman with chronic pain navigating romance amid poverty and trauma. The book tackles serious themes while celebrating connection and joy, representation that's desperately needed in romance literature.

Tune in to hear Dean read an excerpt from "Treading Water", his upcoming novel, and learn how writing serves as healing for both author and reader. Excerpt triggers: poverty, homelessness, explicit scene and language, chronic pain, body image issues, panic attacks, and mention of religion.